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CHAPTER II
ON THE WESTERN PLAINS – SOME OF OUR EXPERIENCES
When we reached the other side, we were in Indian territory, or what is now known as Nebraska, and a short distance north from where Omaha now is. At this place, uncle Joshua impressed on our minds the danger of an attack by the Indians and told us to make plenty of bullets and have our guns well loaded to protect ourselves. Up to this time, I had seen only two Indians. One of them was a squaw named Gripteth, on this side of the Wabash River in Warren County, Indiana. The other one I came upon lying in the grass south of Cainsville, wrapped up in a red blanket. The way uncle talked I thought that we would have to fight our way through. The imagination pictured out every bunch of grass or object in the distance as Indians, but coming closer, we found that we were always unnecessarily alarmed. The scare over meeting Indians gradually wore off, and when we came to the Indians, or rather, when they came to us, I was not as afraid of them as I was of the wolves.
We followed the Indian trail until we came to the Elkhorn River and there we crossed on a willow brush bridge. These bridges lay flat on the water and I did not find out how they were fastened to the banks. Before we reached California, we had crossed over several of them.
We kept a southwest course, following the trail and reached the Platte River, which we followed on the north side. We had traveled about 200 miles in Nebraska. We heard cannons firing and we knew that we were near Fort Kearney and that they were celebrating the Fourth of July.
Uncle Joshua, on a fine bay blooded mare which he had brought from Wisconsin, forded the river after a life and death struggle with the treacherous quick sands along the banks, and managed, by wading and swimming the horse, to get across the river.
After arriving on the opposite bank, he waved his hat in token of his success and started for the fort. He carried with him a seven shot Colts rifle and a five caliber Colts revolver. When uncle reached Fort Kearney, as we afterwards learned, he found that the Illinois train had passed through there two weeks before. Uncle took up the trail and after following for ten days, he overtook them on the south side of the North Platte, a short distance on this side of Fort Laramie near the Wyoming-Nebraska line, at a place called Ash Hollow. The river was forded and the cattle, sheep and horses were now on the right bank of the river.
The night after uncle had left the camp, we were camped near the river on some ground which was level and smooth. Aunt and her two children, Henry and Ellen, were with her in one of the tents. During the night there was a heavy rain or water spout. I was lying on the ground with my boots and coat under my head, and I was awakened by the water which had partly covered my body. I heard aunt crying and calling: "Where is Henry? I can't find Henry."
I started to go to her and got into deeper water and realized the water was raising very fast. I reached aunt, who was holding the little girl in her arms and she was hysterical about the boy. I heard a splash and following the direction of the sound in the darkness, I got my hand on his head and lifted him out of the water. I took aunt and the children to a covered wagon, where we stayed until morning. The water had raised until it was two and one-half feet deep, when it began to go down and by morning it was all gone. We were not able to understand where so much water came from so quickly or where it had gone, as the river was about a mile from the camp.
We broke camp and trailed on westward on the north side of the river, and after several days, we met uncle, who was returning from overtaking the Illinois train. He had halted them at Ash Hollow, near Fort Laramie. We finally reached their camp and for the first time after about a thousand miles' travel, the two trains were united.
It will be remembered that the junction place was to be Independence, Missouri, but the meeting place turned out to be in the borders of Wyoming. The two herds made 1500 sheep and 500 cattle and we were on the borders of the rough and tumble freaks of nature near the foot hills of the great Rockies.
After we had passed Fort Kearney in the month of July, we saw great herds of Buffalo going north. At times as we looked across the Platte River, we could see countless numbers of them and the earth would be black with them for miles. The droves would travel in "V" shape, with the leaders at the point. When a drove would cross the river toward us, it was necessary to use the utmost care in order that our cattle would not stampede. We would herd our cattle up close and get out with our guns and by shooting and holloing, we were able to turn the buffalo in a direction away from our cattle.
We came to high grounds, once, where there was excellent grazing and we stopped there for the day, to let the cattle and stock take advantage of the good grass. While we were eating our dinner, two Indians came riding up, with two of the finest spotted ponies I had ever seen. They got off and were holding them with a sort of a lariat, as they had no bridles, when Bart Robins, one of the men with us, made the Indians understand by signs, that he wanted to ride one of the ponies.
He mounted one of them and rode away to round some of the cattle which were straying. When Bart first started off, they did not care, but when they saw him circle away from the main herd, they evidently thought that he was running away with it, and one of them jumped on the other pony, fixed an arrow to his bow and started in pursuit. By yelling as loud as we could, we attracted the attention of Bart and motioned for him to circle back to camp. By keeping a circle, he kept out of shooting distance of the bow, and arrived in camp safe, but somewhat frightened over his experience. The Indians got on their ponies and left.
Two or three days after this incident, a chief and about twenty of his tribe, came to us and after a pow-wow, they sat down in a row and uncle understanding the maneuver, had as many of the men sit down facing them, as there were Indians. The chief lit his tomahock pipe, took a puff, passed it to uncle, who did the same. The order pursued, was that the chief would hand it to one of the Indians; the pipe would be returned to him, and he would hand it to uncle, who would give it to one of the men, who would return it to uncle, and uncle would give it back to the chief. The order was maintained until all the men and Indians had a puff at the pipe. When the program was over, the chief arose and said, "How!" and he and the Indians took their departure. This was the "pipe of peace" and meant that they would do us no harm, and we were not to harm them. Evidently this visit was to clear up the misunderstanding concerning the pony incident.
A rule had been made and understood by the men that there was to be no quarreling or fighting in the camp. It is unfortunate in camp life, especially on a trail far west, to have enmity in the camp. Tom Brooks, who was one of the cooks, was a crabbed fellow. James Greek was an orphan boy, who had made his home with uncle for several years, and who one day killed a big buffalo.
In order to preserve the meat, it was put through a process of jerking, which was to cut it into strips to be dried by the sun or by heating. We had made a scaffold by putting forked sticks in the ground and by laying sticks across in them, had made a platform about the fire. After the fire became a bed of charcoal, the meat was laid on the cross sticks to roast and dry.
James, who was a good natured chap of eighteen years of age, and having killed the buffalo, helped himself to a piece of the meat. Tom Brooks ordered him to put the meat back, which he refused to do, Tom jumping onto him and beat him, until his face was black with the beating. The sympathy of the camp was with Jim and Tom lost the respect of the camp by his bullying disposition. Uncle was restrained from taking a hand in the matter, as he could not afford to lose any of his helpers.
One day when uncle and aunt rode ahead to pick out a camping place, he had instructed us to drive the cattle to the left side of the trail as we were nearing alkali water, which was unfit for the stock to drink. He had given us wrong instructions, for instead of driving them away from the danger, we drove them to where they drank the injurious water. As a result, we lost, with what we had killed for beef, about 250 head of cattle. If the sheep drank any of the water, they were not affected.
In the herd of cattle we had left, were forty or fifty milk cows, some of them fresh and we had plenty of milk. The boys all milked except Wm. Nailor, who could not, but had made arrangements with the other boys to take his place and he would do some of their work in exchange.
One day, Nailor, who was in the rear of the train, came in late for dinner. It was customary for every one to have a cup of milk for dinner, and he held out his cup to Tom, the cook, for his milk. Tom, after the others had eaten, poured the milk out on the ground and said to Nailor, "No man who wont milk, can drink milk."
Nailor replied that he had made arrangement for others to milk in his place and that it was none of Tom's business. Angry words followed and Tom took a run at Nailor, butting him in the stomach. Nailor was knocked down, and in falling, his head struck the wheel of a wagon, cutting a gash in his scalp. This ended the fight and Tom, after this, was meaner than ever, as he had whipped Nailor, who had some reputation as a fighter.
It has been over sixty years since these events took place, but I distinctly remember another of the mean tricks of the cook. Tom had a way of cutting out of a side of bacon, the best part, leaving the balance for the family. My aunt spoke to him about it and with an oath, he told my aunt to attend to her own business. Such insolence was endured for the time being, but later Tom paid the penalty, the story of which will be told later.
I remember at one place where we camped late at night, that when we awoke the next morning, we discovered two graves side by side. Near the graves was an endgate of a wagon on which was cut with a knife, the words, "Do not camp here."
Evidently it was a dangerous place to camp on account of the Indians and the graves were mute testimony of that fact. The graves were lined with large rocks or bowlders, and over the top there were also rocks to protect the bodies from wolves. However, the wolves had dug down on one side deeper than the graves and dislodged some of the rocks and got the bodies. Some of the human bones were on the ground where the wolves left them after picking off the flesh.
We followed the headwaters of the North Platte, which flowed to the east, and leaving this river, we soon arrived at the headwaters of the Sweet River, whose waters flow westward into the Green River and on through the Columbia River to the Pacific. If you will take your atlas and find Fort Laramie on the Platte River, and follow it until you come to Casper, and then skirt the Rattlesnake hills on the north, you will reach the Sweet Water River near what is now called Independence Rock and Slit Rock.
The Sweet River Mountains will be on your south and the Wind Mountains on the north, as you cross between, through South Pass along the banks of the beautiful river Sweet Water. We saw the Chimney Rock which stood out by itself like a chimney after the house had burned. I think that it must be what is now called Independence Rock, which name is very appropriate. Also there was the Court House Rock, called that because of the rooms in it as if someone had cut rooms into the soft rock. There was the Devil's Gate, which was a massive ridge of rock, through which the river, some time in the dim past, had apparently drilled, and through the ages, disposed of the rock above, until a deep and straight-faced canyon greeted the "Path Finder" of other centuries.
We camped here for a day and others of the camp discovered a beautiful pool of water jutting out from the river. The water was clear as crystal and we could see in the water the most beautiful fish that I had ever seen. They were spotted or speckled and all about the same size – about twenty inches long. They were the speckled trout so much prized by the anglers of today.
We took one of uncle's wagon covers, tied a log chain to one side along the edge; tied a rope on the other side; got some tent poles and tied them to the end of the cover. We were going to seine this pool of water, when uncle came down to where we were and wanted to know what we were doing. We told him that we were going to seine the pool and catch some of those fine fish.
He said, "You can't catch fish with a wagon cover. You will only tear my cover to pieces and catch no fish. I don't want my cover torn up. I will need it."
We told him we would not hurt his wagon cover, but he forbade us using it. We told him that we had it fixed and we were going to make one haul any how, and show him we could catch fish with a wagon cover. Uncle got out of humor, but we did that once as we pleased. We went in with our seine at the upper end of the pool and dragged down to the lower end, where there was a nice gravel riffle, a nice place to pull out on the side. We boys had seined with uncle John's wagon cover in Elkrun in Ohio, and we understood the business. In the first haul, we had a lot of the finest kind of fish and uncle's wagon cover was not damaged.
Uncle was so surprised to see such a lot at one drag, that he told the men to unyoke the oxen, and that they could dress and fry fish the rest of the day. We caught all the fish they all wanted and as many as they wanted to take along.
